In its final road swing of the season, the Harvard field hockey team came close to a win but ultimately dropped its two games over the weekend, including a 2-1 overtime nailbiter to Vermont (2-16, 0-5 America East) on Sunday in Burlington, Vt.
The Crimson (3-12, 1-5 Ivy) also fell to conference foe Dartmouth (10-5, 5-1), 4-1, in Hanover, N.H., on Saturday afternoon.
The pair of losses extended Harvard’s losing streak to a season-high seven games, but the team is not looking down, according to sophomore forward Noel Painter.
“The losing streak has been tough, and we have not been able to finish and put the ball in the net to get the results that we want,” said Painter via email because she could not be reached by phone. “We are improving every week in all areas of the game.”
The team feels it showed improvement game-to-game this weekend, too.
The Crimson had more corners than Vermont, 7-6, and was outshot, 13-12, improving its ratios from the Dartmouth game. In that contest, the Big Green tallied 16 corners to Harvard’s six and 24 shots to the Crimson’s four.
But this weekend, the improvements did not turn into a win.
VERMONT 2, HARVARD 1
The Crimson suffered a tough loss to the Catamounts in the second of Harvard’s back-to-back weekend contests.
It was a reversal of Harvard’s 2-1 home overtime win against Vermont last year—this time, on their home turf, the Catamounts came out on top.
Vermont took an early lead on freshman Molly Higgins’ goal off a deflection nine minutes into the game.
Despite the early deficit, the Crimson fought back and thought it had pulled even with Vermont. With two minutes left in the half, a Harvard attack resulted in a rebound that bounced back to freshman midfielder Madison Jung, who finished it off. But the referee called a foul because the ball hit a Crimson player’s foot, nullifying the goal.
“All it takes is a few questionable calls to change the outcome of a game,” captain Kim Goh said by email because she also could not be reached by phone. “But we’re trying to capitalize more on our opportunities so that those kinds of things don’t affect our game as much.”
As it turned out, Harvard would even the score at 1-1 just eight minutes into the second half, when junior forward Rachael Rosenfeld tallied an unassisted goal, rifling the ball into the back of the net from the middle of the circle.
The game remained knotted at one for the duration of the frame. The Crimson defense withstood nine second-half shots by the Catamounts, and co-captain goalkeeper Cynthia Tassopoulos had four critical saves.
Read more in Sports
Men's Hockey Downs Bentley, 5-0Recommended Articles
-
Field Hockey Drops Two Weekend Contests
-
Men's Basketball To Face BC in Beantown Battle
-
Field Hockey Wins On Senior DayThe Harvard field hockey team could not quite get a handle on Dartmouth on Saturday, but bounced back against the University of Vermont on Sunday, coming out victorious on Senior Day in the Crimson’s last home game of the season.
-
Men’s Basketball Preview: VermontWith the rest of the College off for break, The Back Page is keeping up with the Harvard men’s basketball team as it wraps up its non-conference schedule. In the first in a series of previews of the squad’s upcoming match-ups, David Freed looks at what Vermont brings to the table.
-
Men's Basketball Notches 250th Win at Lavietes Pavilion
-
Athlete of the Week: Chambers Perfect from Three Versus Vermont